Page 38 of Frequency of Attraction

He knew it would hurt more once he got back to the hangar and got shit for passing out. Control would already know. Harv would have reported it. They were in constant communication with the ground. He wondered if Dasha had had any luck tracking down Annika’s sister. Their village wasn’t huge, but it also wasn’t quite a village anymore. Like everywhere else, his hometown had grown. Or so he was told. Fuck, even his brain was spinning, apparently.

“RTB, or can you go a bit longer?” Harv asked.

Vadim sighed. He pushed past the discomfort rolling in his belly, a trick he’d learned at Star City. Nothing hurt so bad you couldn’t push through it, a broken femur and broken heart included. No, he was not ready to return to base. He needed to see what else the plane could do. What he could do.

“Fucking hit me with it, Harv.”

Later, after a hot shower and a steak salad, Vadim felt better. Thomas had cackled when Vadim climbed out of the cockpit and back onto solid ground. He’d learned that the “hazing” Tate had mentioned meant that they’d intentionally tried to get him to pass out. Apparently, being hazed meant Vadim was truly part of the team. He’d even earned his call sign. The Blue Baron, for his eyes and his last name. Not very clever, but he’d had worse. Tate had pulled him aside, of course, and reminded him that a failure to stay coherent in the goddamn plane wouldn’t set him back on his course to space. That was Tate’s job, he’d realized: taking care of his people. He was always in the background, the structural support of everything that went on. Vadim had still wanted to snap at him that he was full of shit. He’d passed out in a training jet. Truly, that could never happen again. The jokes would end and the worry would start. His abilities would be questioned. Hell, he was already questioning them himself. Vadim had to sit with the fact that Chen and Harv could handle G forces fine and he couldn’t.

When it came to his body, though, Vadim didn’t give up. He sat in front of his laptop, remnants of his salad next to him on the couch, and researched what he could do to keep from passing out again. His space-ready flight suit would help. There were breathing exercises, too, and tricks with the muscles in the body. And the tongue.

He hoped that night would be the last that Quinn had to skip because of her stupid period. He wanted her body. Andhertongue. After a whirlwind day like the one he’d had, sinking inside her and fucking her until she screamed would be a nice distraction. But that wasn’t a possibility.

His phone dinged with a message. Dasha. She’d had no luck finding Annika’s sister.

Fuck. He tossed his phone to the side with a sigh. No closer to his daughter. No closer to making Quinn come. Feeling further from space than ever.

Something—or everything—in his life needed to change.

19

Vadim’s flight had made Quinn more nervous than she’d expected. She didn’t know why she cared so much. They were just fuck buddies, as Elle had said. Sweet Elle. A couple of weeks had gone by since Tate had convinced her to quit. Such a Tate move. Quinn had been sorry to see her go.

Elle leaving was proof that people did have breaking points. After years of overwork and her first broken heart, Elle had reached hers. Quinn wondered if she had one as well. If she was even allowed one.

Back to Vadim. They were just fuck buddies. Except they had kissed last Friday. A week later, her body still lit up like a New Year’s Eve sky when she thought about his tongue brushing hers.

She’d placed a call to a private investigator in Boston, a man she hoped could find an undocumented four-year-old or her mother. If he did, they’d really have something to celebrate. Until then, they had Vadim’s status as a sanctioned American pilot. The reason she was wearing this lingerie.

Quinn had had to go to Orange County to find an intimates store that she actually wanted to frequent. If Elle had still been in Victory, she would have asked her to come along. That was a thing girlfriends did, right? Instead, she’d had Rochelle, the saleswoman at the store in Costa Mesa, find her something “sexy, not frilly,” as Vadim had requested. She’d tried strappy and complicated. Delicate and sheer.

They’d opted for simple. A black bustier top that could be easily removed, and black panties that her booty swallowed without mercy. When Rochelle came out from the back with differently patterned bustiers to choose from, fate had seemed to accompany her. There had been a top with constellations stitched in black. Subtle. Perfect.

Quinn had tried on the ensemble for Rochelle, who’d made her go down a size on the bustier so Quinn’s prodigious boobs squished out the top. She’d poked and prodded and tucked, then declared herself satisfied with Quinn’s look.

Her body was something to which she’d never given much thought until Vadim, who’d brought it to life. He made pockets of her heart come to life, too. That story about his brother? His upbringing seemed desolate. Loveless, maybe. She wanted to fix his darkness.

Looking at herself in her own full-length mirror Friday evening, Quinn had to agree they’d chosen well. From the front, side, and back, the lingerie gave her an exaggerated hourglass shape that she actually liked. She slipped a loose, off-shoulder sweater and snug jeans over the outfit and took time styling her hair. She’d showered and shaved, and even added dusky pink lipstick. Black platform pumps, their highest-end brand, completed her outfit.

Tate was reading on the couch, his typical Friday night before and now after Rosie. He looked up when Quinn clicked by. If he noticed that she was in stilettos and lipstick for a “darts game,” he didn’t comment. “Have fun,” he offered.

She glanced at the book in his hand.Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. “You too, cousin. Don’t get too attached to any of the characters.”

He groaned. Quinn walked away snickering.

More than once on the drive to Vadim’s, her mind wandered to the fantasy that had been haunting her. She’d seen Vadim close to losing control in her office. She didn’t want everything they did together to be calculated. She wanted to see the collected, experienced man break for her. She ached for him to rip off her clothes, fuck her hard and loud, hands everywhere, both of them enthralled with the sight of their joining. But, as he’d informed her, Quinn would have to come before any of that happened.

She was feeling lucky tonight.

A feeling that heightened when Vadim answered the door and couldn’t keep his eyes off the exposed skin of her shoulder, like the spot was some exotic temptation.

“Quinn.”

Straight to her lady parts. Every damn time.

She sauntered past him, mind on the bedroom and a slow striptease. Fingers on her wrist stopped her progress. She registered the crashing of her body against the hard plank of his milliseconds before his lips were on her bare shoulder.

“Hungry,” he murmured.

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